Four Tet Runs Through His Live Gear

You don’t "invent" the genre of Folktronica without being a little out there and experimental. Four Tet (aka Kieran Hebden) prefers to keep the deep tweaks for the studio though and his live setup is all about hands on effects and improvised looping.

Kieran’s first album was made on an ordinary desktop PC with a built in soundcard and Cool Edit Pro, so it’s fair to say he likes to keep things fairly low tech. So while you might not want to build your own Monome MIDI controller or root out the Boss Dr Sampler he uses we can recommend a few alternatives for a sweet improvisational live electronic music setup.

At the center of it all, you don’t want to scrimp on the mixer. You can rely on Pioneer to deliver awesome build quality, inspirational FX and even a built in sound card. Just couple the DJM750 up with Ableton Live Standard and you’ve already got a huge number of options for tweaking samples and arranging on the fly.

The Monome he uses is one of the first MIDI controllers designed for real time arrangement and step sequencing. A great piece of kit but the Novation Launchpad S is setup for Ableton out the box and is cheaper. If you really want to turn Ableton into a hands on instrument, then get a Push, perfect for live use and coming up with ideas in the studio.

For live looping there’s a number of options available but the Boss RC-505 is designed for tabletop use with your hands rather than footstomping guitarists. A whole instrument unto itself, just check our Guide To Loopers to find out more.

If you want to find out a little more about the creative process behind his seminal album Rounds.